The invention concerns an apparatus for applying dielectric or metallic materials onto a substrate disposed in a vacuum chamber, having an electron emitter and having magnet coils disposed in the area of the vacuum chamber, the electron emitter being disposed in a separate generator chamber communicating with the vacuum chamber and forming the anode and, after the introduction of the process gas through an inlet connection, producing a large-area plasma jet which is guided by the action of the magnets between the electron emitter and a target provided in the vacuum chamber, while the positive ions are accelerated from the plasma jet to the target by applying a variable negative voltage, and the metal atoms dislodged from the target reach the substrate.
A method is known for producing transparent thermal mirrors by depositing a film of treated indium oxide or treated tin oxide onto a substrate (EU Pat. 0 020 456), in which the method of deposition is a low-temperature deposition onto a polymer substrate by sputtering, thermal evaporation, vacuum depositing or electron bombardment. During the deposition an oxygen partial pressure is used in a range which directly produces films of the said material with a high transparency and a high reflectance.
In the apparatus used for the practice of this prior art method, a water-cooled target is disposed at an angle of about 45 degrees with respect to the ion jet produced by a jet source, in the vacuum chamber provided with a gas inlet, the ejected target source material producing a coating of the polymer substrate disposed at an angle to the target.
Also known is a plasma generator with an ion jet generator (article by D. M. Goebel, G. A. Campbell and R. W. Conn in the JOURNAL OF NUCLEAR MATERIAL 121 (1984), 277-282, North Holland Physics Publishing Division, Amsterdam), which is disposed in a separate chamber connected to the vacuum chamber, the approximately cylindrical chamber wall of this separate chamber forming the anode and being provided with an inlet for the process gas. The cylindrical chamber is provided with annular magnet coils and with tubes for cooling the chamber wall. The electron emitter itself is situated on a part of the wall which closes the one end of the cylindrical chamber and faces away from the actual vacuum vessel.
Lastly, an apparatus is known (P 37 31 693.1) for the application of materials, in which the electron emitter is provided in a separate generator chamber communicating with the vacuum chamber and forming the anode, and the target is provided in the vacuum chamber, the target having an approximately plate-like configuration and being connected to a coolant circuit.